This study examines Hernán Cortés, first as the author of Cartas de relación (1519-1526), and then as the protagonist of Francisco López de Gómara's Historia de la conquista de México (1552). It analyzes how these accounts represent his speech acts, including some of his key speeches; how they allow him to define the conquest in different ways to different audiences; and how they represent him as controlling the speech acts of others, most notably those of Moctezuma.
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter One: Approaching the Conquest
Chapter Two: The Means and Ends of Empire in Hernán Cortés’s Cartas de relación
Chapter Three: Convincing Likeness: Gómara’s Cortés
Chapter Four: Quoting Cortés in Gómara’s Historia de la conquista de México
Chapter Five: Moctezuma’s Translatio Imperii
Conclusion
Appendix: Texts and Translations of Two Key Speeches
Notes
Works Cited
Index
Glen Carman teaches language and literature at DePaul University. His current research focuses on Bartolomé de las Casas, Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda, and the sixteenth-century debates over Spain's wars of conquest.